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Best Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes when implemented in multiple real-life settings, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities.
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Peer Review Study
Public health funding is traditionally siloed and program-specific. To improve social determinants of health, which cut across multiple sectors, states have moved toward braided and layered funding models. Engaged leadership, shared purpose and vision, formalized collaborative decision-making processes, and administrative procedures necessary to do this work are described in this article.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
1: Ensure federal child care relief funds reach individual early care and education staff in the form of direct cash payments. 2: Ensure health coverage and guaranteed paid leave of at least two weeks for all staff working in regulated early care and education programs. 3: Adjust eligibility requirements for public safety net programs utilized by early childhood personnel until the period when all state ARPA funds related to child care are liquidated. 4: Prioritize equitable distribution of funding to programs located in communities with the most need, which have been impacted most acutely by this pandemic. 5: Improve systems administration and technical assistance to facilitate accessible, simple application processes. 6: Establish essential, yet simple data collection protocols to examine the utilization and impact of ARPA funding in order to inform future policies and resource allocation. 7: Prohibit the use of quality ratings as a determining factor for eligibility to receive ARPA funds or to condition levels of payment.
Emerging Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and produce early results that are consistent with the objectives of the activities and thus indicate effectiveness.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
We recommend that lead agencies, in partnership with other state agencies, implement the following provisions in support of the early care and education workforce: (1) Ensuring federal child care relief funds reach individual early care and education staff in the form of direct cash payments. (2) Ensuring health coverage and guaranteed paid leave of at least two weeks for all staff working in regulated early care and education programs. (3) Adjusting eligibility requirements for public safety net programs utilized by early childhood personnel until the period when all state ARPA funds related to child care are liquidated. (4) Prioritizing equitable distribution of funding to programs located in communities with the most need, which have been impacted most acutely by this pandemic. (5) Improving systems administration and technical assistance to facilitate accessible, simple application processes. (6) Establishing essential, yet simple data collection protocols to examine the utilization and impact of ARPA funding in order to inform future policies and resource allocation. (7) Prohibiting the use of quality ratings as a determining factor for eligibility to receive ARPA funds or to condition levels of payment.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
RELEASE DATE:
Peer Review Study
The article presents strategies of how Durham County Department of Public Health operationalized equity into multiple phases of its COVID-19 response through infrastructure changes and how to apply these methods to future public health emergencies to better serve vulnerable populations. This response relied upon robust data collection of demographic data to identify inequities. Infrastructure changes included standing up multiple COVID-19 Task Forces (Homeless, Community, Food Security, African American) and Strike Teams (Long-Term Care Facility, Clusters) targeting vulnerable populations; placing testing sites in targeted locations; collaborating with multisector and community partners for feedback; and providing Health Ambassadors for in-person dissemination of COVID-19 information. The paper reviews results from these interventions and lessons learned.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
RELEASE DATE:
Peer Review Study
This article reviews systemic factors affecting low income immigrant communities during COVID-19 and provides recommendations strategies to improve public health infrastructure using the Public Health 3.0 concept. This high-risk community represented a large portion of essential workers, who even before the pandemic faced less access to health care and were structurally marginalized. The authors discuss equity strategies including prioritizing COVID-19 public relief funds and allocating testing and vaccines to these communities. The paper also reviews how to improve public health infrastructure to mitigate disparities immigrant communities face by addressing social determinants of health, communicating about and structuring policies and programs that do not require identification, engaging cross-sector stakeholders, and developing tools to collect relevant, appropriate data.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
RELEASE DATE:
Peer Review Study
The objective of this observational, cross-sectional study was to identify, document, and assess the progress made to date in implementing various processes involved in statewide community health worker (CHW) workforce development initiatives. A conceptual model of processes involved in implementing statewide CHW initiatives was developed and applied. Twelve statewide CHW workforce development processes were identified and an average of 8 processes were implemented per state. The results of the study showed that stakeholders have advanced statewide CHW workforce development training initiatives using the processes reflected in the conceptual model, and these results could help to inform future CHW initiative design, measurement, monitoring, and evaluation efforts, especially at state level.
Emerging Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and produce early results that are consistent with the objectives of the activities and thus indicate effectiveness.
RELEASE DATE:
Peer Review Study
This study provides short, intermediate, and long term research and policy recommendations by behavioral scientists on how to mitigate COVID-19 through behavior change to slow its spread by enhancing the understanding of impact of health inequities on underserved minority populations. Both the research and policy recommendations included in this commentary emphasize equity-driven (1) research practices, including applying a social determinants of health and health equity lens to monitoring, evaluation, and clinical trials activities on COVID-19; and (2) policy actions, such as dedicating resources to prioritize high-risk communities for testing, treatment, and prevention approaches and implementing organizational, institutional, and legislative policies that address the social and economic barriers to overall well-being that these populations face during a pandemic.
Promising Practices that show evidence of effectiveness in improving public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting, as indicated by achievement of aims consistent with the objectives of the activities, and are suitable for adaptation by other communities.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
This report outlines the catalyzing conditions for sustaining healthy communities, with the central premise being community power-building approaches. Public health partners can use this roadmap to build community power, which includes setting agendas, changing public discourse, building relationships with decision makers, and creating governance structures. The report also highlights sixteen community power-building efforts across the United States.
Emerging Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and produce early results that are consistent with the objectives of the activities and thus indicate effectiveness.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
This report recommends changing work policies to support employee wellness at public health agencies. Public health infrastructure is often hard to maintain due to high turnover and burnout, especially during times of crisis like COVID-19. Work policies such as flexible schedules and remote work have been shown to increase employee well-being. It also recommends the establishment of cross-jurisdictional sharing arrangements to share key staff between public health departments, e.g., epidemiologists. This can serve as a solution to chronic underfunding of public health agencies at the federal level.
Novel Practices that show potential to achieve desirable public health outcomes in a specific real-life setting and are in the process of generating evidence of effectiveness or may not yet be tested.
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Summary Report/Recommendations
This article outlines the policies gathered and supported by Massachusetts’ Task Force on Coronavirus and Equity, including ensuring housing security, securing worker rights, demanding police accountability, applying data collection, and planning for equity.